


Unburdened

by Good0mens



Category: The Old Guard (Movie 2020)
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Blow Jobs, Bottom Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Canon Queer Character of Color, Canon Queer Relationship, Comfort Sex, Emotional Sex, Erotic Poetry, Explicit Sexual Content, Good0mens fic bingo, Immortal Husbands Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova, Implied/Referenced Homophobia, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani is an Incurable Romantic, M/M, Mentioned Booker | Sebastien le Livre, Religious Guilt, Religious Imagery & Symbolism, Top Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani, ambiguous timeline
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-03
Updated: 2020-11-03
Packaged: 2021-03-08 18:40:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,941
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27361393
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Good0mens/pseuds/Good0mens
Summary: "Joe lays a slightly shaking Nicky out on the bed and strips him of his clothing, revealing Nicky’s cock, which looks almost obscene; pink and swollen, tipping upwards toward Joe’s mouth like it's begging for touch. Every part of Nicky was like that, the axis of his entire body tilted towards Joe, waiting for Joe to lay gentle hands upon him."Joe makes Nicky feel good, when the world wants them to feel anything but.
Relationships: Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova
Comments: 27
Kudos: 339





	Unburdened

**Author's Note:**

> Who had *checks notes* 'religious imagery,' 'weird metaphors about fruit', and 'hand porn' in their bingo card? 
> 
> Anyway, here's another Joe fic about how much he loves Nicky, because when you find your niche you gotta run with it apparently.

Joe lays a slightly shaking Nicky out on the bed and strips him of his clothing, revealing Nicky’s cock, which looks almost obscene; pink and swollen, tipping upwards toward Joe’s mouth like it's begging for touch. Every part of Nicky was like that, the axis of his entire body tilted towards Joe, waiting for Joe to lay gentle hands upon him.

Joe takes Nicky’s face in his hands and kisses that curved smile, catching Nicky’s bottom lip and pressing in close. They slide together in a slow movement, taking in the taste of each other. Joe’s tongue licks into Nicky’s mouth; he feels the moan Nicky lets out, and Joe does it again, again, again. Does sacrament live here, Joe wonders, in the dark crevasses of Nicky’s mouth? Joe pulls back, watches Nicky’s huge pupils, glassy eyes follow Joe’s mouth, spit-slick lips parted on a sigh.

Joe traces a finger along Nicky’s bottom lip, then takes his chin between his thumb and forefinger, watches as Nicky opens his mouth wider.

“Is this okay?” Joe asks, because he needs to know Nicky’s on board.

Nicky nods once, and Joe tilts his head up and devours his mouth once more.

Nicky brings a hand up to caress Joe’s face, fingers massaging the bearded lines of his jaw, encouraging Joe to kiss him harder. He obliges, letting go of Nicky’s chin to catch Nicky’s raised wrist in his hand.

“I’m gonna take care of you, habibi,” Joe whispers, voice tender, uneven with emotion.

Joe slides a thumb along Nicky’s wrist and then Nicky’s opening his eyes, and suddenly everything is reduced to just the need singing in his veins and this beating pulse. Two heartbeats, pushing in tandem against each other’s skin, like they could reach out and intertwine their lifelines together. Joe feels the throbbing of Nicky’s heart, as tender as the body that bears it, feels the throbbing of his own cock in time against Nicky’s. It’s enough for now.

 _Settle yourself in for a prayer, love,_ Joe thinks, _we’re going to be here awhile._

Joe casts devotion onto Nicky, like thistle leaves bursting up in all the places it shouldn’t, leaving little nettling teeth marks against Nicky’s jaw, his neck, his nipples. The Bible says only cursed ground will produce them, but Joe has always thought their shape resembled church spires; the sharp, rough exterior, those jagged edges, the pointed tip. Or perhaps they resemble Nicky’s nipples as Joe bites the pointed nub; the jagged breath that rushes out of Nicky’s chest; the sharp thistle sting of his nails where they scrape along Joe’s nape.

“I’ve got you,” Joe says, and Nicky’s tight grip on his neck eases slightly.

This has been building for some time now; Nicky’s been sleeping with his fingers wrapped around a gun handle instead of Joe’s hand, and they’ve been handling each other with a fragility that makes Joe feel entirely too breakable.

He’s not breakable – _they’re_ not breakable. Joe has not endured centuries of hurt for this to be what defeats them.

Keane shoved a gun in Nicky’s mouth, pulled the trigger, pulled a shout from Joe, hoarse and animalistic as it ripped itself from his throat, pulled memories forward that Joe is far too eager to forget; people trying to put Nicky on his knees, fisting their hands in Joe’s hair, trying to make something ugly out of their love. Doctrines that dictate love and allow diatribes of hatred.

The memory lingers in the space between their hands at the dinner table, pinkies an inch apart. Untouching.

Booker had told them that they’d always had each other, as if their love wasn’t ever used to make them feel weaker, used against them. As much as Joe wishes it didn’t, a masonry of individual uncertainties sometimes build up a wall between him and Nicky. When the world surrounding you tells you that your love is sin, how do you stop shame from seeping into all the broken parts of yourself? Centuries worth of hatred, unlearned.

The desert plains of the Maghreb scream out, his home is calling his name across generations, across the vast space between his and Nicky’s hands. it’s all the same - a confession, unanswered.

It wasn’t always exactly like this; at first, it was their differing religions, at times, the colour of their skin, and now, their homosexuality. It sometimes felt like change was impossible, that at every turn, they were going to have to defend their love. 

But the polished stone on Oscar Wilde’s grave had to be replaced because of the sheer amount of kisses laid upon it, and Joe will lay kisses upon Nicky’s body until it’s ruined, until the rough scrape of his beard is healed into all the cracks of his skin. Until all it knows is love, and nothing else.

Rend the flesh from the bone, wrest the man from the martyr, make something new out of these old hurts. 

Joe makes his way down Nicky’s body, circling his finger around the tip of Nicky’s cock like the rim of a wine glass, _the blood of Christ_ – dips his fingers into the mess there, then flicks his tongue along the head and has a taste.

The sound Nicky makes as Joe puts his mouth on him would make Jesus tremble, would put God on his knees. Unrepentant. He licks along Nicky’s cock, takes him between his lips, feels the heavy weight of it on his tongue.

Nicky draws his knees up, the arch of his heels digging into Joe’s shoulders. Joe takes his cock deeper into his throat, brings a finger to Nicky’s furled opening and rubs the skin there. Nicky’s grip on his nape tightens reflexively. His breaths are still shaky, exhaling out of a tight chest, pulls from the taught lines of his throat. Joe plans to break him down, pull at the thread of desire and unravel the rest of his uneasiness with it.

Joe slides his mouth up and down Nicky’s cock. It was so long ago now, that Joe gave Nicky his name, then his life, then his love. Now, he gives Nicky his mouth, takes Nicky’s body between his parted lips like he’s at communion. He can think of no finer altar to worship at.

He pulls away, briefly, only to slick up his fingers, then returns to the warmth between Nicky’s thighs. He pushes a finger inside slowly, eyes trained on Nicky’s face. He can feel Nicky’s calves clenching, the hairs rubbing along the rounded edges of Joe’s shoulders as Nicky shifts his legs further apart. Nicky’s flushed face, eyes squinted shut as Joe works him open, reflects a solemn beauty worthy of immortalising in stone, in charcoal, but Joe much prefers him like this, in soft, sinuous flesh.

Joe’s lips are cracked, bleeding from biting his lip as he watches Nicky surrender to the pleasure of his fingers - he soothes his tongue over the sting, feels it heal. Then he does the same to the skin of Nicky’s thighs, breaks the blood vessels underneath open, bright reds and purples welling up before they disappear. Nicky flinches when Joe kisses the spot, but he lets out a deep moan as Joe does it again, again and again, pressing into Joe’s mouth like a peach begging to be bruised, soft and dark.

He can hear the squelch of the lube as he fucks his fingers into Nicky’s hole, three of them now, and he can hear Nicky asking for _more, please, Joe-_

Each time his body is remade, Nicky’s cells recreate themselves. Every time the skin heals, he becomes new again. Undamaged. Joe has the pleasure of rediscovering every inch of Nicky’s skin, lays claim to each and every part of his body, like it’s new. In some ways, it is.

Joe pulls his fingers from Nicky, sticky and hot, using the remaining lube on them to slide his hands over Nicky’s pretty cock, weeping at the head, wet and beseeching his touch. Nicky rolls his hips up into it, fucking Joe’s hand, mouth open on a moan. His eyes are open, brows furrowed like he’s confused by the pleasured sounds coming from his mouth. Better, but still entirely too controlled, tense like he’s a curled spring, ready to attack.

Joe runs a calming hand down Nicky’s side and kisses him. Joe has learned love in every language, has learned different ways to say Nicky’s name, and each time it tastes new, feels new in his mouth. He is struck with the urge to seek out his Nicolo from centuries ago, outside the walls of Jerusalem, and tell him that he’s _forgiven._

“Joe, please, I need you,” Nicky begs, and Joe cannot deny him anything when he’s like this.

When he slides into Nicky, heaven and hell, sin and purity, mean nothing. There is nothing but _this_ , Nicky’s sob as Joe’s cock brushes against his prostate, the tight heat clenched around him, those beautiful eyes shining with unshed tears.

When Joe is greeted at the gates of death, they will ask him _what’s the worst thing you’ve ever done?_ And Joe will tell them of the love he hides in the crook of his elbow, behind the shell of his ear – because it belongs only to Nicky, and his body should bear the marks of a man well loved, not the bruising curves under his eyes or his too-cold fingers, unheld.

Hands and holding them. Holding fast, holding tight. What were these hands built for, if not to hold Nicky’s own? So he does, slides his hands into Nicky’s hands, slides his cock in and out of Nicky’s body. Turn each other inside out and trace the hurt, erase and replace it with their little divinity.

Joe watches as Nicky tries to hold it together, even as Joe fucks him harder, holds him down into the sheets so he can keep Nicky on the edge, hips bucking uselessly upwards. It’s hot and heady, the rhythm of Joe’s hips as they thrust inside Nicky, the jolt of Nicky’s body each time he pushes in, the clench of it as he pulls out.

Nicky’s eyes are clenched shut, so Joe shoves in hard and keeps himself there, delivers a filthy roll of his hips, groaning at the tightness of Nicky’s hole.

“Look at me,” Joe says, and it comes out as a plead, because he’s desperate to see Nicky’s eyes, needs to look at his lover, reassured in the fact that _he’s here, they’re here, they’ll always be here-_

Sea glass eyes find Joe’s own, teary and overwhelmed. It steals the air from Joe’s lungs, the vulnerability laid bare in Nicky’s eyes. Joe draws back out and starts a new pace, punching out cries from Nicky with every thrust.

 _Let me see you,_ he wants to say, _let me see you fall apart._ He wants Nicky to break, under him and him alone, wants Nicky to give him all that weight. _I can take it_ , _I can take you._

“I love you,” Joe breathes out instead, because he can think of nothing else to say that encapsulates how he feels, bringing Nicky to ruin with his hands, his mouth, his cock, “I have loved you since the start, and I will love you at the end of everything, at the end of me, at the end of love.”

Joe feels the moment Nicky gives in, letting all of it go. Feels the wall crumble down with his tears. Feels it break. Undone. Nicky shudders and comes, tucked safe in Joe’s arms, and Joe can do nothing but follow him down, like always.


End file.
